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T O P I C R E V I E W

Henk Boshuijer

Looking at Ed Hengeveld's Photo of the Week 225 made me wonder whatever happened to these Command Module Simulators? Are they scrapped, sold, stored or somewhere in a museum?

Wouldn't it be great to tryout one of these sims?

Ken Havekotte

It appears the LM sim is in storage inside the VAB; the same unit that was used here at KSC's Flight Crew Training Building, and I think one of the CMs is there all wrapped up. I'll report back later.

Robert Pearlman

The publicity notes for Tom Hanks' HBO miniseries "From The Earth The Moon", note that the only existing command and lunar module simulators were recovered and used by the production.

For filming, they were moved to the Naval Training Center in Orlando, a military facility that was no longer in use.

The National Air and Space Museum's online collection database and the website for the Cradle of Aviation Museum, note that the lunar module simulator was transferred by NASA to the Smithsonian, which in turn loaned it to the Garden City, New York museum.

According to the Cradle of Aviation, only one such simulator was ever built.

The command module simulator is now on display at Science Museum Oklahoma (formerly the Kirkpatrick Air and Space Museum).

Henk Boshuijer

I have read somewhere that there used to be three Command Module Simulators. Two were located at KSC and the third one was at JSC.

Tom Hanks used one of them for the HBO miniseries "From The Earth The Moon" so maybe Ken is right about one CMs still being in storage inside the VAB.

I hope Ken is able to find out what is wrapped up in the VAB.

Philip

I believe most Apollo era simulators were based at NASA Langley in Virginia at the East coast of the USA.

Especially those with a huge Lunar surface wall photo are amazing to see...

nasamad

The 1968 CM News Reference shows listings for two CM Sims. AMS-1 was at MSC in the Spacecraft 103 (Apollo 8) configuration, and AMS-2 was at KSC in the Spacecraft 101 (Apollo 7) configuration.

They were probably continually modified during their lifetimes, so may now be configured for the ASTP mission.

GACspaceguy

quote:Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:The command module simulator is now on display at Science Museum Oklahoma

We were just at the Science Museum Oklahoma:

aneedell

The Crew compartment at Oklahoma is from the JSC CM Simulator. The complete KSC simulator is in storage at NASM's Garber Facility. All the optics and other components were used by HBO, but not the crew compartment. That compartment was stored in an uncontrolled environment in Melbourne, Florida, and is now at Garber requiring serious conservation. The KSC optics and SIM SUP control panels are in good shape at Garber.

------------------Allan NeedellSpace History DivisionNational Air and Space Museum

Apollo Redux

They really should convert them to a theme park ride. I'd play all day.

Proponent

Have you tried the Orbiter space simulator? Created by a physicist, it is highly realistic and is available for download free of charge.

There are a couple of different Apollo add-ons for it. But because of Orbiter's realism, it will probably be some time before you have the skill to fly an Apollo mission in Orbiter.

Henk Boshuijer

quote:Originally posted by aneedell:All the optics and other components were used by HBO, but not the crew compartment. That compartment was stored in an uncontrolled environment in Melbourne, Florida, and is now at Garber requiring serious conservation.

It's good to know the whereabouts of both simulators. Is there any chance that we will see the CSM-sim on display after restoration? Are there any pictures of the restoration/conservation process?

aneedell

We do not currently have plans or funds to restore the CM SIM. We'd love suggestions of potential partners in restoring and displaying the entire CM SIM.

ilbasso

I imagine that displaying the full CM sim would be a massive undertaking. You have not only the crew cabin, but also the displays that were attached to the windows. And you have the platform it was mounted on...and then do you also include all of the computer equipment and controls that were integral to the simulation?

Henk Boshuijer

It would be great to have the entire simulator on display including all the optics somewhere in the world.

Are museums worldwide aware that there is a CSM-sim waiting for restoration and that it needs a place for display after restoration?

Mark Zimmer

I recently acquired a NASA photo of the Lunar Module Mission Simulator and the NASA labeling on the back indicates that this simulator was in Building 5 in Houston. However, I keep seeing references to the Lunar Module Mission Simulator being at KSC rather than at Houston. Is this the same one and it was moved to KSC at some point? Was there more than one? Who, if anyone, would have trained on the one at Houston?

Thanks for any info or background about this piece of equipment you can provide.

Editor's note: Threads merged.

Mark Zimmer

I was able to get a good deal more information about the LM simulators at the ASF show from the astronauts themselves.

Rusty Schweikart confirmed that the astronauts spent a great deal of time in the LM simulator and that they did a fairly good job of simulating the actual experience of working with the systems.

Fred Haise noted that there were two of the LM simulators that were identical, one at Johnson and one at Kennedy. If your mission was up next then you worked on the one at Kennedy and if you were the one after, you were at Johnson. The one behind that would be at Kennedy and 4th in line would work at Johnson. They thus rotated through both simulators. They simulated hundreds of different problems in these simulators, though of course not the one that they ended up having in the Apollo 13 Service Module; the thought was that if there were such an explosion there would be nothing to simulate since they'd all be dead.

Charlie Duke added that the one at Kennedy was specifically set up for your particular mission. The LM simulator at Johnson was set up in a more generic way, not being particularly specific to your planned mission. The windows had TV screens that would show the anticipated areas you would see; it was pretty primitive but got the job done. He also pointed out that the one at Johnson in my photo was used by him, John Young and Gene Cernan around the clock during Apollo 13 to try out various scenarios to get the crew back, so this LM simulator from Johnson is an even more important part of history than I suspected.

This is all contrary to the information on the internets that I had been able to find, which suggested that there was only one LM simulator; clearly there were two and they each stayed at Johnson and Kennedy and were used throughout the Apollo programs.

Joel Katzowitz

I was fortunate to score a set of cue cards from Lunar Legacies that were used in the KSC Lunar Module Simulator during training for the Apollo 13 mission. The cards were consigned by the gentleman who was the Simulator Instructor at KSC for the entire Apollo program.

SprocketCur

Just a side note for anyone still listening to this topic: The USSRC has the LM training simulator from JSC along with one of the CM trainers. Both are on display in the Saturn V Hall in the Davidson center for Space Exploration on our campus. Both are about to be integrated into a new portion of the exhibition there that will be constructed over the next year or so.

I should clarify that we don't have the optics for either piece. Just the actual sims themselves

Buel

So does this mean that there is still one LM simulator in the VAB at KSC?

Three were the primary Command Module Simulators, with one at Houston and a pair at the Cape. Two were the primary Lunar Module Simulators, one at each site. At Houston, a Command Module Procedures Simulator trained crews just to rendezvous with the command module, as there was a Lunar Module Procedures Simulator for lunar module rendezvous and landing training.